Shane Flanagan slams the referees performance following Brisbane’s 12-10 defeat of Cronulla
LESS than a week after his Sharks won due to refereeing errors and pontificating about how teams need to “take the referees out of it” to win football games, Shane Flanagan has taken aim at the whistleblowers over Cronulla’s loss to the Broncos.
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ON Wednesday Cronulla coach Shane Flanagan said teams need to “take the referees out of it” to win football games.
On Thursday night he put the whistleblowers right in the middle of it.
Cronulla’s top-four aspirations took a hit after falling 12-10 to Brisbane in a bruising match at Suncorp Stadium.
The Sharks enjoyed 55 per cent of possession, only completed 27 of their 37 sets and halfback Chad Townsend missed a regulation conversion attempt that cannoned back off the goalposts.
Yet the Sharks coach turned the attention to the referees again, a week after benefiting from two controversial decisions in their win over Canberra, declaring the officiating “wasn’t up to scratch”.
In an end-to-end affair, the Broncos defended their way to victory, including holding the Sharks out for three consecutive sets in the final 10 minutes.
But a series of decisions, including the video referee’s call to deny Ricky Leutele a first-half try after he ruled the Sharks centre had planted the ball on Jamayne Isaako’s foot, left Flanagan frustrated.
“The no-try to Ricky Leutele, the bunker has got to have sufficient evidence that the ball didn’t touch the ground,” Flanagan said.
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“I watched every replay. Brave call to say the ball definitely didn’t touch the ground.”
Sharks skipper Paul Gallen added: “They looked at it 20 times.”
Cronulla blew a chance to push their top-four aspirations, remaining in fifth place on 26 competition points, now equal with the Broncos.
“It was a couple of decisions in my book (that cost us). There was just too many of them,” Flanagan said.
“We were on the receiving end last week, the positive end, we are on the opposite end this week, the negative end.
“That is a concern for the game. That refereeing standard tonight wasn’t up to scratch.”
It was in stark contrast to Wednesday’s press conference, where Flanagan appeared to come in to support the under-fire referees.
“I think that department is doing its best,” Flanagan said the day before the Broncos clash.
“They haven’t got it right and they put their hand up, let’s just hope we work really hard as a code to get it right for when the big games come around.
“There have been a couple of decisions that went against us but we need to be good enough to get the win considering the decisions and take the referees out of it.
“I heard some chat around getting rid of the Bunker but it wasn’t that long ago we were saying we need technology, we have it why don’t we use it — now we’re using it and we want to get rid of it.”
The result leaves the door ajar for Penrith to leapfrog them with victory over Manly on Saturday at Brookvale Oval.
Victory by the Roosters over St George Illawarra at Allianz on Sunday can open up a two-point gap between the top four and bottom four of the finals contenders in a congested leaderboard.
Before a crowd of 22,859, Cronulla had chances to secure a dramatic, late win but just couldn’t crack the desperate and committed Broncos defence.
A simple missed conversion by Cronulla halfback Chad Townsend ultimately cost the Sharks.
It had a real, grinding, tough, finals feel about the game.
“We knew it would tough coming up here,” two-try Sharks fullback Val Holmes said. “We had plenty of chances but didn’t capitalise.”
Before kick-off, Immortal Andrew Johns claimed Cronulla were a “dark horse for the premiership”.
“We were brave and tried really hard,” Flanagan said. “A tick for effort.”
But the title race appears wide open.
Brisbane have now won five of their past six games.
“There is definitely a great feel in this side,” Broncos skipper Darius Boyd said.
But it wasn’t all good news for the Broncos’ whose finals chances suffered a blow when forward Alex Glenn suffered a suspected broken arm.
They were lucky Isaako didn’t join him in the casualty ward when he crashed spectacularly to the Suncorp Stadium turf after colliding with Cronulla’s Matt Moylan from a Sharks short dropout.
Referee Grant Atkins penalised Moylan, despite his eyes being only on the ball, telling Sharks prop Andrew Fifita although it was an accident, the five-eighth’s chase put Isaako into a dangerous position.
Moylan had an up-and-down night. He threw an intercept pass in the 14th minute which allowed Brisbane to run 82 metres to score the first try.
Brisbane centre Boyd took Moylan’s ill-timed pass before sending winger Corey Oates on an untouched run to the tryline. It was Oates’ sixth try in six games against Cronulla.
Oates, who wants to play in the back row, has been linked to North Queensland, Canterbury and Parramatta.
Cronulla hit back through a spectacular try from close range. It was offload after offload before Holmes crashed over to give the Sharks a 6-4 lead.
But their lead didn’t last long when Broncos replacement Matt Lodge surged over from short-range, bursting through tackles of Aaron Woods and Fifita to score under the posts and a 10-6 lead.
Fourteen minutes before halftime, it appeared Cronulla had struck back.
On a sneaky short side play, Sharks centre Ricky Leutele forced his way over but grounded the ball on Isaako’s boot, the try denied. It was a decisive moment.
Brisbane fans’ dislike for former NSW skipper continues. He was loudly jeered with each carry last night.
Gallen jarred his neck after passing the ball when hit by Broncos forward Sam Thaiday. The tackle was legal, Gallen stayed down but played on.
Fifita left the field during the first half with a stomach bug but returned.
Early in the second half, Sharks hooker James Segeyaro cut Brisbane open from dummy half before sending Holmes ran away to score his second try of the game to lock up the scores at 10-all, before Townsend missed the conversion as it rammed into the upright.
Brisbane’s Jordan Kahu landed a penalty goal minutes later for the matchwinning lead.
“Give them credit, they defended well but we didn’t execute,” Gallen said. “We should have got that done.
“That was a hard loss because I think we should have won. But we haven’t.”
Cronulla were without Wade Graham, who withdrew from the patch with his partner, Karianne Lafrance, giving birth to their first child.
In a big few weeks, Cronulla play Manly (h), Melbourne (a), Cowboys (h), Newcastle (h) and Canterbury (a), while Brisbane face Canterbury (a), Cowboys (a), Souths (h), Roosters (a) and Manly (h).
BRISBANE 12 (M Lodge C Oates tries J Kahu 2 goals) bt CRONULLA 10 (V Holmes 2 tries C Townsend goal) at Suncorp Stadium. Referee: Grant Atkins, Matt Noyen. Crowd: 22,859